WordPress SEO basics: permalinks, categories, images, Rank Math

URL / permalink structure (slug)

The permalink is the article's link, e.g. https://yoursite.com/cinema-apk-vs-stremio. Google reads the URL to understand the page — a messy, overlong URL without the main keyword hurts SEO.¹

Best practices:

• Use the main keyword in the slug (e.g. cinema-apk-vs-stremio).
• Avoid dates or version numbers (no 2025, v3.4.1).
• Lowercase only.
• Short and readable — never post?id=123.

In WordPress: Settings → Permalinks → select "Post Name", or use a custom structure: /%category%/%postname%/.

Categories and subcategories (taxonomy)

A category groups related articles. Example: parent category "Streaming Apps", with children "cinema hd", "Stremio", "Pluto TV".

This helps Google and readers understand your site structure, surfaces related posts together, and can help you rank for category-level keywords too.

SEO tip: use one relevant category per post, and keep category names clean, short, and keyword-rich.

Image optimization

Large images slow a site down, and Google penalizes slow pages; images without alt text or keyword-rich filenames also miss out on Google Images traffic.

• Compress — e.g. ImageCompressor.com.
• Rename — e.g. cinema-hd-interface.jpg.
• Alt text — always add descriptive text using the target keyword, e.g. "Cinema hd home screen on Firestick".

Rank Math plugin

Rank Math automates roughly 80% of on-page SEO work and is considered more beginner-friendly than Yoast SEO for most users.

Setup: Plugins → Add New → search "Rank Math" → install, then follow the setup wizard. It handles titles and meta descriptions, focus keywords, the sitemap, and schema markup (e.g. FAQ rich results).

Worked example — "Cinema hd vs. Stremio"

• Slug: /streaming-apps/cinema-apk-vs-stremio
• Category: Streaming Apps
• Image name: cinema-vs-stremio-comparison.jpg
• Alt text: "Comparison between Cinema hd and Stremio streaming platforms"

Summary

Footnotes

1. iSkills SEO course notes, compiled 2025. ↩